November 13
“Now it was told the king of Egypt
that the people had fled, and the heart of Pharaoh and his servants was turned
against the people; and they said, Why have we done this, that we have let Israel
go from serving us? So he made ready his
chariot and took his people with him. Also, he took six hundred choice chariots, and
all the chariots of Egypt with captains over every one of them. And
the LORD hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the
children of Israel; and the children of Israel went out with boldness. So the
Egyptians pursued them, all the horses and chariots of Pharaoh, his horsemen
and his army, and overtook them camping by the sea beside Pi Hahiroth, before
Baal Zemphon. And when Pharaoh drew near, the children of
Israel lifted their eyes, and behold, the Egyptians marched after them. So they
were very afraid, and the children of Israel cried out to the LORD.”
The Israelites accused Moses of not dealing with them fairly, murmuring that he should
not have led them out of Egypt. This occurs just days after they went out with
a high hand in the sight of all the Egyptians, joyful that they were free. How
quickly their faith evaporated when fear began closing in on them!
The Egyptians, their horses, their
chariots, all the shining army and might of Egypt were represented there. The
Israelites' backs were up against the sea, and they could see the death
sentence approaching them as fast as a horse could pull a chariot. They thought
their lives were hanging in a balance when they saw the army. The end of their
lives was quickly coming within view.
Had not God given them enough evidence through all His plagues against
Egypt? Had He not given them enough evidence to impact their thinking, clearly
dividing the Israelites from the Egyptians, beginning with the fourth plague?
All of the plagues fell on Egypt, but none of them after that fell on the
Israelites. Had He not impressed their minds enough on Passover when the blood of the Lamb enabled their firstborn to live
while the Egyptians' died?
We can learn and grow from this
lesson. In principle, we all come to our own personal Red Sea. Every one of us
fails repeatedly, just as Israel did when they lost their faith for a while.
What we go through when we come up against our personal Red Sea is very similar
to what Israel went through.
God rescued and chastened them, but
He did not dump them. He shows that He will continue to work patiently with us just as a teacher continues to work with students,
even though some fail and rarely do anything well. A teacher is faced with the
same principle that we are involved in with God. The teacher does not want to
fail students, so he uses all of his time, energy, and effort to encourage and
instruct so that those who are failing will turn around, catch the vision, and
begin to apply their full attention to the work.
God thinks of time in the same way a
teacher does: “There is still time to catch this person's interest and turn
them around.” Therefore, God gave the Israelites forty years in the wilderness.
Hebrews 11:29
shows that these people did recover their faith in time to go through the Red
Sea. The major reason that they turned themselves around may have largely been
because of faithful leadership, primarily by Moses and possibly by others as
well. They exhibited some measure of faith, and God faithfully and duly records
it.
This ought to encourage those of us
who fail from time to time. Many times our faith has failed, but God patiently
continues to work with us. We cannot become discouraged, but must keep going on,
because God will not stop. He will keep working with us.
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